a student found a story about weathering rates of gravestones, which focuses on a study that GSA is sponsoring called the Gravestone Project — my surprise was due to the fact that they actually found something that matched with the chemical vs. physical weathering we were discussing in class last week!

This is the week right before spring break, so I’ve fallen behind a bit in posting while I was distracted by writing a few exams. I’m going to India starting on Saturday, so I hopefully can catch up (if not get a bit ahead!) this week.

discussions about the future of space travel are still cropping up — the most recent from Discovery News

because we were also discussing volcanoes, one student found an article about a recent Hawaiian eruption of “Pele’s braids” (which I could not find a reference to in my quick & dirty search of my volcano books and reputable internet sites)

(The impact story was popular as was the Titan story–both had multiple summaries.)

I’m finding it fascinating to see what my students dig up that relates to my Solar System class — I’m so used to the articles about earthquakes, volcanoes, and flooding, that I’m enjoying the change of pace.